


Part X:  The Necessary Ones

by A_Fine_Piece



Series: A Thin Red Line [37]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, Married Sex, Scheming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-01-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 04:23:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5771137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Fine_Piece/pseuds/A_Fine_Piece
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hisana and Byakuya discuss Rukia.  Orihime has been taken to Soul Society....</p>
            </blockquote>





	Part X:  The Necessary Ones

**Part X: Best-Laid Plans...**

Jumping over the brook

for water

not needed

—Matsuo Bashō

* * *

 

**The Necessary Ones**

Darkness covers the room. The shades are thick, blacks and blues. The shadows paint them, like camouflage, turning them into creatures of the night. Darkness flashes across skin made silvery-blue by the moonbeams.

Disruption.

Their movements, wild and kinetic, dance across the walls, ceilings, and floors. The shadows shift and change until every movement suddenly feels amplified, until the shadows on the walls, ceiling, and floors tell their story with the same reverence they are paying one another.

There is poetry in their actions. Their motions are fluid, when necessary. Jagged, when necessary. Sometimes imperfect, and sometimes perfectly imperfect, when necessary.

Their poetry written in the shadows turns them into objects  _and_ subjects.

Look too quickly and he can see their actions twice. The shadows pull at his periphery, as if he is chasing ghosts, but he stops, choosing instead to push aside the feeling of spectacle, of being subject and object.

But he cannot conquer the gnawing feeling that they are on display, that maybe what they are doing is  _reckless_ , that maybe they will be exposed.

It's probably because they should not be here, in his office, doing what they are doing. The door is not latched. It is never latched. There wasn't enough time. There never is enough time.

_But…._

She caught him just as he was leaving.

_But…._

He hasn't seen her in two, long weeks.

_But…._

She started this, he thinks to himself as his fingers pull at silk, loosening her  _many_  ties.

She surprised him at the office, reaching for the door to enter just as he was reaching for the door to leave. When he pulled it back, he found her, staring at him with those large, imploring eyes of hers. A large wicker basket hung from the bend in her elbow. She had come to bring him dinner.

She was going to say something, but he stopped her.

There was something oddly endearing and erotic about his wife surprising him with basket full of homemade goods.

So, maybe  _he_  started this.

 _Have there always been this many?_  he wonders of the ties as he fumbles with a particularly stubborn knot.

Has his wife always been so thoroughly constrained? So many layers. So many knots. So much silk.

How has he forgotten all the steps necessary to release her? Has it been this long? Too long. Even longer still as he struggles with a belt to an under-robe.

Likely feeling him pulling the knot  _tighter_ , her hands, smooth and soft, flitter down to his. With a touch, the tension in his fingers melt, and his hands cup her hips. Gently, he pulls her up, on the edge of his desk, and he leans down, lips searching hers before exploring the contour of her neck.

She tastes like salt, but she smells of almonds and white plums.

He closes his eyes and indulges, kissing down the line of her shoulder to her clavicle. His heart yearns for them to be one, and he pulls her closer. Closer yet. Skin to skin. It would be impossible to draw her nearer, yet nearer he craves. He wishes he could envelop her into his essence. Devour her. And, briefly, he wonders if this is how a hollow feels when it seeks its prey.

He shoves this thought aside as he feels the fall of her robes begin to release. Instinctively, he pulls at the hem of her sleeve, and the one, thin barrier between them falls to floor. The sweet susurrus of silk against hardwood tells him that she is free.

With a breath catching in her chest, she breaks away. Hungrily, her eyes are on him, taking in every line of his male hardness. It isn't long before her hands begin to follow her gaze. Her fingertips, light and soft against his skin, trace the expanse of his abdomen, and her lips thin as she feels the quickening of his muscles tensing underneath.

"You were always the pretty one," she teases lightly before giving a deft tug of his obi. In a single pull, his hakama falls, and she flashes a self-satisfied grin.

She knows his binds better than he knows hers.

"Untrue," he retorts, but, before she can respond in her typically pat way, he catches her lips and stifles the rumbling at the back of her throat with a forceful kiss.

And down they fall onto the desk. Her raven tresses splay across the dark grain, and he takes a moment to admire her beauty. She is delicate and pale. Her skin follows tautly to her frame, and her lines are long, despite her diminutive size.

She is his, and he is hers.

When his gaze lingers too long, she reaches to pull him down to her. "Lord Byakuya," she murmurs against the shell of his ear once he is against her.

When they wake in the morning, it is in the captain's barracks. He does not believe she has ever seen his home away from home. He rarely uses it.

Her gaze travels the expanse of the room. It is all cedar wood, and smells musty from months of disuse. "So this is the captain's quarters," she says softly before turning in his arms to face him.

He does not respond. Instead, he watches her, waiting for where she is going with this inquiry.

"It looks precisely like the other barracks," she says, eyes glistening as if this detail excites her in some way.

"You are amused," he observes, voice low.

Hisana's gives a lop-sided grin. "A little," she confesses.

"You were expecting something grander?"

A little shake of her head tells him that he guessed wrongly. "I was hoping it would be no different, but I was expecting to be disappointed."

He smiles, bemused at his wife's logic. "We are a unit. The Sixth requires all its men, from the lowest, unseated officer to its captain."

 _Silence_.

He knows this silence. It comes when his words, unknowingly, conjures a demon in his wife's mind. She is trying to master it, habituate to it.

When the thought no longer prickles her, she asks, voice gentle and measured, "How is Rukia?"

He senses that she feels deep contrition over their duplicity.

"She refuses to speak to me or anyone she believes knew, rightly or wrongly."

"Have you attempted to make amends?" Hisana's question is the obvious one, as she is more than aware of his penchant for show, don't tell, even where it makes no sense.

The question isn't misplaced, he thinks. He doesn't particularly like it either, but he supposes that's the  _point_. He's not very good at making amends, at giving apologies.

"I thought so," his wife teases lightly under her breath before untangling herself from him.

He watches her in silence. The lines in her back shift and move with such surprising delicacy as she shrugs on her garments.

 _She is right_ , he thinks to himself, his gaze following the fluttering movements of her fingers as she ties the many complicated knots of her robes.

Part of him wants Rukia to understand that they would not have done what they did if it was not necessary. She is a cherished member of his family; he does not take her feelings lightly.

Part of him knows Rukia is aware of why they did what they did. He sees it in her face when she doesn't think he is looking. There is sorrow there, but there is understanding, too. Perhaps that is the source of her pain. She is wounded, but she wants to believe her siblings would not toy with her emotions without purpose.

"A long time ago, my sweet husband counseled me that if I my calligraphy were ever to improve, I would require  _practice_ ," Hisana begins as she perfects her obi.

Byakuya lifts his head, fully aware of where she is going with this sentence, but never stopping her.

"Practice, milord," her voice is soft and low as she draws her final conclusion, "is all you need to refine your skills at apologizing."

Reflexively, his jaws tighten to contain the smile burning to spread across his lips.

"The boys are growing," he says, digressing.

"Yes, the nurse was kind enough to bring them to the  _Second_  for a visit." Hisana's voice dips and sharpens at the mere thought of the  _Second_.

Byakuya's ears prick at the hardening in his wife's voice, but he waits before addressing the matter. As much as he loves her, she is a stubborn woman. He could offer to burn down the Second, and she would refuse out of obligation or some strangely misplaced sense of duty.

"Forgive me, milord," she says, shooting him a gentle, sidelong stare. The sunlight streaming in from the nearby window halos her, making her appear as if she is made of liquid gold. "The Second requires my services for another fortnight."

He has long wondered, but never inquired:  _For what purpose do they need my wife?_  He assumes it has to do with the towers and related technology that they stole from his family. When he withdraws from his own thoughts, he finds his wife staring at him. There is something on her mind; something that she struggles to put into words.

"What if I said no?" he asks, hypothetically.

Yes, this is where he is now—the hellish land of hypotheticals, where motives are less cryptic than desires. To speak plainly of either, motive or desire, would have been a Sisyphean task, indeed.

Hisana represses the urge to smile, but he can see the strain around her eyes as she smothers it. Despite her efforts, his wife still appears  _amused_  at the cover he has taken. "I suppose I would have to obey the order of my husband, wise and decorated, but that would put the House of Kuchiki in open defiance of an order rendered by the Gotei 13."

"What then, Lady Hisana? What then?"

"Well," her lips twist to the side, and she glances up, pensive. The logistics of his hypothetical arrest her imagination, and she takes a seat, the edge of the bed dipping slightly under her weight. "When there is a dispute among the central governing branches of Soul Society, the conflict is to be resolved by the uninvolved branch. As the Central Chambers is currently fractured, due to the large number of wise men and judges remaining in the Second's custody, I don't know what would happen."

"Nothing would happen," Byakuya states, confident in his conclusion.

Temptation flashes across her features, and, like fire catching, it spreads to her eyes. Beseechingly, she stares at him. Words, heavy and useless, spill unspoken in the space between them, like sand into a crevasse.

His eyes pin hers, and he deepens his stare, praying she can read his mood, his thoughts, because, surely, he cannot put his disdain toward her absence into words. Not words that would be appropriate, meaningful discourse.

It would be reckless, lawless, and plenty of other adjectives that end in –less.

But, then again, as much as he tried, rule-abiding really wasn't in his nature.

"I do not," she says, but her voice breaks before she can complete her thought.

He won't make her complete her thought. He already knows.

_I do not want to bring more shame._

His heart goes still, withering at the thought that she feels her desires would bring  _shame_. The thought that his family could impose  _shame_  on her for wanting her  _freedom_  repulses him.

But, no matter how repugnant it is, he doesn't reject her analysis.

* * *

 

"Mace spray," Rukia muses as she toys with the small canister. "Why would a woman need this?"

Orihime watches Rukia with some caution, clearly feeling uncomfortable with the prospect of  _answering_  her idle question. "Um, there are bad men in Karakura Town."

"There are bad men in Soul Society," Rukia assures her as she examines the list of ingredients.

"Give me that!" Ichigo grouses, wrestling the can away from Rukia's wiry fingers. "You'll hurt yourself."

"No, I won't!" Rukia protests, arms still flailing to retrieve the item he stole from her. Ichigo manages to defend against most of her attacks.

"Says the girl who can't work a juice box," he slings the reply as if it is supposed to burn.

It doesn't faze Rukia one bit. She merely folds her arms against her chest and gives a small huff.

"Still could've used less than the  _whole can_ ," Renji says, staring menacingly at Orihime.

"It was two weeks ago, Renji," Rukia replies and playfully elbows him in the side.

Orihime blushes under Renji's death-stare. "Apologies, Mr. Abarai. I didn't realize it was you in that dark alley."

"Probably shouldn't  _attack_  women in darkened alleys,  _Renji_ ," Rukia teases darkly.

"I was under orders," he growls.

"Did Brother attack Ms. Inoue?"

Renji cocks his head and gives her a glare that could flay flesh. " _No, Rukia. He watched. In horror._ "

" _Horror_  sounds a little  _much_ ," Rukia retorts sardonically. "Sure he wasn't  _laughing_?"

"Horror. It was abject horror."

"Mace seems pretty painful," Orihime observes in a short, chirpy voice.

"I just don't get how it could affect him," Ichigo observes, leaning back on a cushion and tossing the can in the air out of boredom.

Rukia attempts to pluck the can out of the air, but Ichigo's reflexes prove quicker.

"Mr. Urahara gave it to me," Orihime answers with a little shrug.

"So, what if your attacker had been mortal?!" Ichigo's eyes widen at the implication, and he tosses the can back up into the air, finding his little game with Rukia a perfect diversion.

"Well, I'm  _not mortal_ ," Renji gripes, still traumatized from the night.

"So, what's the deal?" Ichigo asks, snatching the canister from Rukia's grasp mere seconds before she paws at it.

"Go home," Renji replies, voice bladed and brow cocked.

Rukia shakes her head.  _Same song, second verse._  Ever since Renji…well,  _Brother_ …apprehended Orihime and brought her to Soul Society, the question that reigns supreme over  _everyone_  is when and under what circumstances Orihime will be released.

"We go home  _together_ ," Ichigo states pointedly.

"It's quite alright," Orihime says, voice placating. "I'm not afraid. In fact, it's kind of nice here."

 _She's too nice,_  Rukia thinks to herself as she eyes the girl with a skeptical look.

Orihime pulls the hem of her dress tight over her knees, which are neatly tucked under her. "Really," she says, voice wavering as she attempts to convince them. "All my needs are met."

Ichigo frowns at Orihime's lilting voice.

Rukia shares his sentiments. Although. . . . Orihime doesn't have the look of a wounded animal.

Conveniently, Orihime turns her attention to Kurosaki, allowing Rukia to get a better look at the girl. To get a better look into the girl's eyes.

No. Orihime does not have the eyes of a suffering woman. In fact, she seems calm, determined.

"Kurosaki," Rukia snaps, not particularly minding the chatter coming from the mortal boy, "you should return to the World of the Living."

Renji gives Rukia an incredulous glare. She catches her friend's reaction in her periphery, but she  _knows_.  _He's amused at her sudden 180._

Ichigo, however, gapes at her. Words, however, are slow to manifest, and she capitalizes on the boy's fluster.

"Inoue will be taken care of."

He stares, questioningly.

"Trust me, okay?"

His stare hardens until he looks as if he is throwing daggers  _with his eyes_.

"It wasn't hard for you to check on her?" Rukia states more than asks, but she can't help the upward inflection in her voice.

Ichigo doesn't question her.

"No one wishes ill on Inoue. If we did, it wouldn't have been so easy," Rukia's voice rushes over him, and she hopes its  _sound_  will quiet his suspicions. "You have  _my_ word, Kurosaki."

"I need a time." His voice dips, low, almost guttural.

"Give us two weeks."

Rukia doesn't know why, but that's the amount of time she thinks it will take before they make their decision.

 _If she can't do it in two weeks . . . it can't be done._  


End file.
